So there I was, cowering in the midst of the countless angry Pokémon who ruled the night. Bits of sticky sludge dripped onto my feathers as Muk stood over me and salivated as he munched on his trash, and Raticate's tail whipped back and forth excitedly as he readied his fangs to dig into me with a lethal Crunch attack. Where are Gumshoos when you need them, am I right?

"Puny grassy ghost," Raticate drawled. "You're goin' down! Crunch!" His fangs glowed white and he struck out toward me. I flinched, preparing for shocking pain...

"Counter!" A form stepped in front of me, and Raticate's fangs strangely didn't meet my feathers. I cracked one of my eyes open slowly and saw a lanky, furry red creature standing right between Raticate and I, one of its arms in the Mouse Pokémon's mouth. Fear filled Raticate's eyes as the new Pokémon tore his arm free, then punched the rotund gang leader with all his might. He flew all the way back into the tall grass and landed hard on his back, and didn't get up again. Fainted.

The Rattata shrieked and dispersed to tend to their leader, and I got up to thank the Pokémon who had saved me. He was all too familiar, and a sight for sore eyes. "Certainly took you long enough to show up," I nudged the wiry Pokémon.

"We're not done yet!" he replied, and ducked under a sudden ball of sludge. I whirled around and saw the Muk gang, still not letting up, cornering both me and the red Pokémon against the tall grass. I gulped, but my friend just smiled and winked.

Then, faster than I could comprehend, yet another Pokémon, a light brown quadrupedal canine figure, rose up from behind Muk and the Grimer, jumped high above them and yelled, "Stone Edge!" His blue eyes flashed once, and giant, pointed stones erupted from the ground right from under the Sludge Pokémon. They grimaced at the sudden sharp pain, but their opponent wasn't finished yet.

"Now, Accelerock!" the Pokémon howled, and he rammed right into Muk with all his strength. Not even a Pokémon tanky as he could survive such a combination, and the gang leader fell. As the Grimer scurried over to lift him back to the Recycling Plant, the canine Pokémon landed in front of them to face the two of us. His breathing was heavy, but he smiled nonetheless. As soon as both gangs had fully retreated, the two new Pokémon came in for a high five and fell over laughing.

"Dude, you should have seen Decidueye's face when he was cornered by those guys!" the red Pokémon howled. Like the brown one, he was canid, except he was taller, stood on two legs, and had long, lanky arms that ended in huge rock-hard paws. His eyes glowed red in the darkness as he flipped his white combover of fur out of his face.

"Ah, come on, it wasn't that bad, Midnight," I retorted, shaking off any dirt and sludge that had gathered on my feathers during our little scuffle.

"Yeah, he's got a point," the brown wolf-like Pokémon agreed. "I mean, he was at a severe disadvantage there. Dark-types. Oof." He got up from the ground and smiled at me. "Been a while, huh, Decidueye?"

"Hasn't been too long, bro. Only a few weeks," the other one also got up and stretched. "Feels like forever, though. I haven't had the chance to fight like that since springtime!"

You may be wondering who these two are, for them to come saving me at my time of need and all. Well, they're only two of the coolest Pokémon the API has to offer: the Lycanroc twins, Midday and Midnight, hailing from Ten Carat Hill. When I arrived at the Institute for my freshman year, Vikavolt was my only friend, so naturally I was really nervous, and I didn't know what to expect from the other Pokémon. But the Lycanroc and I got off to a really good start, and before I knew it, I was part of their little gang, and it was awesome. With Midday always available for his incredible insight on pretty much anything, and Midnight to make you constantly laugh and help you keep the beat in band while he blitzes on his drumset, both Lycanroc had something great to offer, and it was impossible not to see anything in either of them. And they might be great alone, but together, they were unstoppable.

"It's good you're here, Decidueye," Midday patted my shoulder with his front paw. "We were starting to worry you wouldn't show up."

"You were the ones who were late!" I replied. "If you had been one second later, I'd be Dark-type food by now!"

"Yeah, and I'm not hearing a 'thank you'..." Midnight taunted, examining his bitten arm. It was plenty damaged, but not anything a good old Max Potion couldn't fix. The inventions of humans sure were impactful, even long after their extinction.

"Well, thanks," I said genuinely. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it," Midday nodded, shooting a tiny glare at his brother. "Well, now that we're all here..."

"Right! I got something to show you, Decidueye!" Midnight reached into the fluffy white fur atop his head and pulled out a wrinkly, official-looking document. We all gathered around him as he straightened it out. Midday constantly looked around to make sure no locals decided to take a stroll around the Outer Cape, or worse, the gangs returned. Whatever the Lycanroc were showing me, it was obviously classified.

"Now, don't go telling anybody, 'cause I don't think we're supposed to know about this so early," Midnight brought his voice to a whisper, which was rare for him. "But I nabbed this from one of those fancy human copying machines the professors use to copy documents while no one was looking. Listen to this: Come the new term at the Alolan Pokémon Institute, a special new exchange program will be executed with a school not previously known of, and professors are encouraged to tell the students. At least eleven Pokémon will be required to participate, the program will run the entire year, so on, so forth. Can you believe that?"

I cocked my head. "Yeah, the API's having an exchange program. We've had them before. So what?"

"So, this school's never been heard of until this year! For all we know, it could've just appeared out of nowhere. The document doesn't even state the school's name, what island it's on, nothing," Midday explained. "Doesn't that sound the least bit shady to you? And keep your voice down!"

"Sorry," I whispered. "But I'm sure the deans have everything under control. They always know what they're doing, right? They're probably two of the smartest Pokémon I know."

"Not when they hired Tapu Lele, they weren't..." Midnight grumbled.

"You gotta agree, though, man, this does sound awfully strange," Midday looked to the moon in thought. "Solgaleo and Lunala may be smart and all, but you can't always trust the system. One day they might not be able to protect us. Besides, every Pokémon makes mistakes."

"But those two used to be practically gods, it just doesn't seem..." I sighed. He was right, as usual. But how bad could it really be? The API was probably the safest place in Alola, at least that I knew of. Even if the program did prove to be a problem, Lunala and Solgaleo would have it under control. I knew that both boasted incredible power to go along with their scholar-like intelligence.

"Ah, we'll discuss this later," Midnight said suddenly, folding the paper back up and sticking it in his fur. "We're on vacation, after all! No need to get all worried. So, Decidueye, how've you and Vikavolt been over in northern Melemele?"

A pang of realization hit me like Raticate's Crunch would've if the Lycanroc weren't there to save me. "Oh, sun and moon, I forgot all about Vikavolt! Dartrix is probably killing him by now, and he's likely wondering where I've been, and, and..."

"Hey, take it easy, bud," Midnight nudged me with his bad arm, which made both of us flinch. "We'll go back into town together and find him, along with that little brother of yours. Oh, and if you don't mind, it wouldn't hurt for the two of us to head up to Hokulani with you to watch that eclipse tomorrow, would it?"

"Course not! We can all go up together, you guys, me, Vikavolt. Sounds fun!" I started to walk back toward Malie City, a Lycanroc on either side of me. I decided it was for the better that I forgot about the exchange program, or at least until the vacation was over. I mean, I was hanging out with the Lycanroc brothers, so it was pretty impossible to be down-in-the-dumps and cynical even if I tried.

I don't remember much after that, as it was late, and my mind wandered to the next day's eclipse more than enough times to get Midnight annoyed. We got back to the city and met up with Vikavolt and Dartrix, each carrying a can of lemonade, likely from the Malie Community Center. Vikavolt's idea, no doubt. The five of us all strolled back to the hotel, and the Lycanroc told me along the way that they had taken a plane all by themselves to get here. I grunted with envy, hating the protectiveness of my own parents. I'd be a junior at the API this fall. I could take care of myself.

Anyway, we got to the hotel, and the twins and I parted ways until morning. Vikavolt, Dartrix and me all entered our room, where my parents already slept on one of the large branches jutting out of the wall, specially tailored for Grass-type Pokémon. Dartrix and I took the other, and Vikavolt slept on the floor with no complaint. It took me a while to finally fall asleep despite my fatigue, but when I did I fell into a deep slumber with dreams of the moon crossing paths with the sun, and terrible explosions when they met.